Bah! At the lower levels of the sport you’re getting somewhere between $100-$500 with no win bonus. Fining a guy 20-25% just cuts into how much money he has for beers that night. No one is paying their rents at the lower levels.

Moving up to higher levels and fines make more sense but the frequency of people missing weight drops off dramatically.

Donnie’s Solution:

Ammy – Miss weight once you get a ‘shame on you’ note.

Ammy – Miss weight twice and you lose your license for the remainder.

Ammy – Miss weight three times you lose your ability to get a license in that area.

Pro – Same deal except the second time you miss you lose your ability to get licensed.

Frankly people fail to recognize the safety issue when people miss weight and focus on the lack of respect. You either have someone who is struggling to make a weight and doing damage to their body in the process or someone who is intentionally missing weight to have the advantage in the ring.

Commissions needs to better understand weight cutting to really make a change like this though. Right now the majority have such a miopic view of it that they get lost in the process.

The commission needs to automaticly force the fighter up a weight class after the second time the fighter misses weight . For all of North America.The last 3 pounds a fighter doesn’t cut can make all the difference in winning and losing.

Somthing needs to be done about how much wieght these guysare cutting.they are doing serious harm to their kidneys some without realizing it. I personally know some wrestlers who are far too young for the kidney problems they have. I heard ideas of placing restrictions on how much a fighter can wiegh on Fight day compared to the wieght class ex. Lightweight fighter can wiegh no more than 170. But I could see problems with guys just cutting and not fully rehydrating for second wiegh in.

Why should someone who can cut weight safely be punished because someone else can’t? That would be like saying Fighter A has poor takedown defense so we’re going to limit how many takedowns his opponent can shoot on him. There is enough good and legit information on weight cutting out there and weight cutting can be as much of an advantage as a good guard.

Fighters have the option to cut weight or not but that should be the fighter’s and their camp’s decision not the decision of a commission. I’m not opposed to seeing what people weigh walking into the ring but I am opposed to limiting the amount of weight people can cut.

This is why I’m in favor of a system that escalates as fighter’s miss weight. Missing weight once in a career can be a forgivable thing but consistently missing weight means the fighter needs to personally evaluate the decision to fight at that weight. Note, this does not mean the commission steps in and regulates them to a heavier weight.

Sorry Tyler if you have kidney problems, but cutting weight is part of the sport. Some guys can’t cut weight or choose not to, others cut 15 plus the day of weigh ins and others choose to use a scientific system to cut weight then put the weight plus some back on.